David Pogue Talks Cameras

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David Pogue is here to discuss the latest updates in electronics. This New York Times writer and technology guru explains small cameras with big possibilities in his article Cameras Are Small, Quality Is Big:

If you’re an electronics fan, you have plenty to be grateful for at this year’s Thanksgiving dinner: The dawn of easy-to-use touch-screen gadgets. A sensible C.E.O. at Hewlett-Packard. Angry Birds.

And if you’re a camera buff, you can give thanks for the arrival of three of the best cameras ever made: the Sony NEX-7, the Samsung NX200 and the Canon S100.

Why are these cameras so spectacular? Because they provide the best possible photos from the smallest possible device. They’re not about goofy gimmicks; they’re about putting bigger image sensors into smaller bodies.

Sony’s year-old NEX series has turned a lot of heads and sold a lot of cameras. The daring concept: Stuff a pro-size sensor (APS-C size, the same thing you’d find in, say, a Canon Rebel) into a camera whose body could fit in a jeans pocket.

Even with the lens on, the result is half the size and weight of a traditional S.L.R., while producing the same stunning photographic results. (The NEX cameras are even smaller than the popular Micro Four Thirds cameras from Panasonic and Olympus — yet the sensor is 60 percent bigger.)

Now, there have always been sacrifices. On all previous NEX models, you lost the built-in flash. You lost the eyepiece viewfinder, too — you had to compose your shot using only the screen. And you lost a good deal of usability; with so little room for physical buttons, the NEX cameras required crushingly inefficient on-screen controls.

“Look, we know it’d be pricey,” moaned the tantalized photographic masses. “But what if we said ‘Price be damned’? Couldn’t you put in a viewfinder, a flash and some physical controls? That’d be the ultimate!”

And lo, Sony went back to the drawing board and came up with the NEX-7, whose arrival in the United States has been delayed by floods in Thailand. (Sony says it’s working around the clock to get the manufacturing up to speed.) It really is shockingly pricey: $1,200 for the body alone, $1,400 with a 3X zoom lens. But for the deep of pocket and the high of passion, it really may be the ultimate.

Read more at The New York Times